As a space dedicated to commentary about (ostensibly) fresh viewpoints
on relevant topics from the local to
the international, this column’s efforts at critical thinking have often been, well, critical.
Over the better part of two years,
the subjects of my written disdain have included the Office of Trademark
Management, the English measurement system, Democratic strategists, People for the Ethical Treatment of
Animals, Oregon State University,
radical feminists, Ralph Nader, voting machine manufacturers, Abu Ghraib military guards, the University of
Michigan, Sudanese janjaweed,
fist-fighting priests, Michael Moore, the Electoral College, John Ashcroft, Tom DeLay, frivolous lawsuits, several
members of the Programs Finance Committee, President Bush, the town of New London, and several brands of politically correct, “ideologically incestuous,” and usually self-serving
nonsense-rakers. Per the suggestion of one of my more devoted readers, I’m drafting this, my next-to-penultimate column, with a different tenor.
Freshmen, you won’t remember, but your student government wasn’t
always this way. Sure, the PFC hearings have always been heated messes of
arguments, grievances and hotly
contested debates (though this marks the first year in my memory that has seen injunctions, suspensions or — my favorite — accusations of “sleeping with the devil” directed at some
ASUO officials).
But before you were here, the Executive wasn’t the collected and usually level-headed authority you know today. Last year, under President Maddy Melton and Vice President Eddy Morales, it was a muddle of gross
conflicts of interest punctuated by
dereliction of constitutional duties,
incomplete campaign accounting,
election scheduling blunders, a several thousand dollar deficit and (eventually dropped) charges of assault.
While nearly any Executive
imaginable would be an improvement over last year’s bumblers, ASUO President Adam Petkun and some other officials who have avoided scandal have mostly managed the office with an aplomb and sensibility deserving applause in its own right. They have become the first administration in my five years at the University characterized more by reason and progress than by self-induced controversy and, sometimes, severe ethical failures.
In a Senate meeting early in his term, Petkun pledged to be “very committed to making sure that the ASUO Executive office is fiscally
responsible and is an example for the rest of the ASUO.” And so they have seemed to be. With the arguable
exception of money spent on a
finance retreat, the Executive’s record has been spotted with none of their predecessors’ fiduciary blemishes.
The events surrounding that
embattled retreat made for the
administration’s biggest blunder this year: Even though the conduct that
evidently took place at the retreat
calls into question the validity of
using student dollars there, the
administration has defied fair inquiry and hidden its response to the incident behind a philosophically incoherent veil of “collective responsibility.”
But I promised praise, so here: Petkun helped clean up the messes of last year’s administration. While the Constitution Court’s then-chief justice declared Melton unfit for duty after
she failed to find law students to fill
vacancies there, the incoming
Executive managed to find candidates by early July — when law students aren’t even in session.
When the hiring of an ASUO staffperson’s husband sparked “concerns about the appearance of nepotism,” Petkun stepped in and issued a hiring ban. The Executive also registered record numbers of voters in last fall’s registration campaign and made good on its campaign promise to nix the “sketchy scheduling fee.”
But Petkun’s shiniest moment this year was his involvement in the tricky, contentious brouhaha about funding the Oregon Commentator. Where
other administrations have faltered, Petkun remained true to the spirit of viewpoint neutrality, even citing and bringing copies of the Supreme Court’s Southworth decision.
While every student government administration suffers problems — such is the territory of governing
a complex, diverse community —
student leaders’ success is defined by how they respond to those challenges. And, more often than not, Petkun and several other ASUO officials have
met those challenges with an even-handedness that freshmen shouldn’t take for granted.
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